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December 16, 2009

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Tennessee state senator Jim Tracy has emerged as a strong Republican contender for the seat of retiring Rep. Bart Gordon (D-Tenn.) and has touted his conservative voting record in the state legislature in launching his campaign.

But Tracy's voting history could become a campaign issue in the Republican primary: Election records from Bedford County show that he voted in six Democratic primaries between 1990-2002, including the 2000 presidential primary between then vice-president Al Gore and Bill Bradley.

During that time period, he voted in only two Republican primaries, including the 2002 Senate race between Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ed Bryant. Since 2002, he's voted exclusively in seven Republican party primaries.

There is no party registration in Tennessee, which has an open primary system, so Republicans can cross-over to vote in Democratic primaries (and vice versa).

Tracy said that he has always been a Republican – indeed, when he was elected to the state Senate in 2004, he was the first Republican in over a century to win the seat. He points to the region’s ancestral Democratic history as the reason for voting in Democratic primaries.

Conservative candidates for local offices still identified with the Democratic party a decade ago, even as many have shifted their political allegiances since then.

“I’ve always been a Republican. In Bedford County, if you want to vote for a local conservative election official in the 90s, you had to vote in the Democratic primary,” Tracy told POLITICO.

But in a primary where he’s facing an outspoken conservative, former Rutherford County chairwoman Lou Ann Zelenik, his decision to vote in a Democratic presidential primary (possibly for Al Gore) could become an issue in the race.